After 12 long years of cultivating his garden, Prince Philip has finally done it: grown truffles in his own backyard. OK, not in his backyard, but at the queen’s Sandringham royal estate in Norfolk. Close enough.
Since 2006, Prince Philip has been attempting to raise truffles, planting a grove of more than 300 oak saplings impregnated with truffle spores. According to Britain’s The Times, he has become the first person in Britain to do so.
With about 70 known truffle species to choose from, which one did Prince Philip choose to cultivate? Oh, you know, only la crème de la crème, the French Périgord black truffles, also known as “black diamonds.”
And he did it all for the queen — as he would.
“They have been highly successful,” Adrian Cole of Truffle U.K., which supplied the trees for the royal estate, told The Times. “The majority have been the French Perigord black truffle, as good as you get.”
Prince Philip is keeping tight-lipped about just how much of his crop he’s harvested. “You will never get that information out of a truffle plantation owner,” Cole says. “They are very secretive about it.”
As its name would suggest, French Périgord is a black winter truffle variety grown exclusively in the southwestern region of Périgord, France. And according to Food & Wine, these delicacies sell for anywhere from $175 to $225 per 3.5 ounces.
Prince Philip has no plans to sell them, though. They’re strictly for family and friends. We just wonder what cocktail Queen Elizabeth pairs with her truffles… gin perhaps?
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